So receiving did not feel safe, and then I spent years guarded and missing out on so much– love, money, friendships, and the opportunity to share my gifts– all because I didn’t know how to do things differently.

Can you relate? One of the questions I hear most is “How can I be receptive/ feminine/ intuitive in a healthy way? So here are some tips:

1). Make a list of things you love, and things you hate. I know, hating may not seem polite or spiritual and that’s exactly the point. By simply allowing yourself to acknowledge what you don’t want, you’ll have the discernment and trust in yourself that allows you to OPEN to what you do want. You won’t be so afraid once you do this exercise. Trust me. It’s powerful.

2). Ground yourself. If you don’t know how, listen here to a 4-minute free sample grounding meditation.

3).If you’re stuck trying to solve a problem or process an emotion and it’s not resolving, know this: It’s NOT yours. Our own problems feel like creative challenges, not hopeless mazes. Our own emotions release after a good cry or laugh or scream. So if that’s not happening, let them go. Imagine a magic soap bubble out in front of you with a magnet in it, and imagine the emotions or problem get pulled out of you into the bubble. Then see it float off as far as you can imagine and poof! Explode it. Those people will get their emotions or problems back and they’ll get the gift of finally being able to resolve them!

4). Look at your programming and role models around receiving. Did you learn to block and shield, or to take on other’s burdens, or that being open all the time was more feminine or spiritual? Once we can see our patterns, we are most of the way there to releasing them! This is why intuitive readings can help as well, since someone outside our world can often see it more clearly than we can.

5). Once you see your patterns, act them out. I mean it. Get silly! You can grab a friend for this one, exaggerate your “issues” with your partner, or do it by yourself in the mirror until you laugh. Then see if you that pattern has any hold on you again!

6). If there is something you want to know and you find yourself obsessing and wishing you had a crystal ball… stop, sit down and ground. Then close your eyes and imagine a movie screen a few feet out in front of you. See it blank, then ask your question in your mind and imagine that you “see” the answer on the screen. Be open to symbols, colors, or vague information as well as full-on movies. Trust you will be shown what will most benefit you today. When you’ve had enough, turn it off, open your eyes and enjoy being consciously receptive!

7). Ask yourself, “Where am I right now?” Of course, you know where your body is but where are YOU? Where is your attention? Simply by noticing when you are not “home,” you have the opportunity to come back to your body. When you’re present, you’re much less likely to absorb things that don’t feel good.

8). Feel your own feelings. Often when we are habitually “not home”, we are trying to escape pain. If you have physical pain, if you don’t see a spark of light in your own eyes, or if you feel numb– these are signs that you’re not feeling fully. Yes, it’s uncomfortable to feel but the only way out is through! Once we breathe into the edge of our discomfort, it begins to dissolve. Breathe and feel!

9). Fill yourself up by enjoying your life– no waiting. It may sound paradoxical to fill yourself up when you want to receive– but when you are living a full life and radiating creativity, joy and bliss– you are a magnet for more of the same. Like attracts like.

10). Know this secret. Receiving is a CHOICE. Receiving does not just happen to you, and you can choose how to receive. I learned this in the martial art of Aikido. I could take being thrown hard, because I knew how to use the energy to twirl into a somersault and come up standing. It was exhilarating. You may not be doing martial arts, but make it a game… Decide that every judgment thrown your way turns into a hundred dollar bill. Decide that every lustful stare makes you more attractive and beckons your soulmate. Choose your version and have fun!

Often, I hear women complaining that male energy feels so “heavy” to them that they want to get away from men. Or, women ask me to heal their partners, and I keep bringing the reading back to them.

As much as we know we cannot change anyone but ourselves, we women have an innate perfectionism that ties in to our biological baby-making mechanism. When we make a baby, we must put the eyeball in the eye socket and not in the kneecap– or we have a big problem. We don’t need to make everything else in our world perfect, but it’s natural for us to try.

I also think that on a collective level, the feminine energy has in general not felt seen, honored or met by the masculine. Out of hunger for love the feminine has tried desperately to fix the masculine, often to the point of assuming responsibility for what’s not ours.

So about me and my Dad…

I have always had a soul connection with my Dad, but it was rough for many years. A sensitive soul and creative thinker, he also had a drinking problem and for lots of my childhood and early adulthood was spiritually “checked out”.

I was so attuned to his energy, and so wanted his love and my family’s peace, that I unconsciously absorbed both his pain and his dreams. I lived them as if they were my own.

Did this help my Dad? No. In retrospect, looking through a psychic lens, it only seemed to make things worse because I was reflecting to him parts of himself he’d denied.

So he got mad at me. And then I was not only not helping him, I was getting the opposite of what I’d wanted!

Once I started on my path of personal growth, I learned to meditate and clear energy, and I realized how much of his energy I was holding in my body. So I diligently cleared it, day after day for years. I stopped taking responsibility and I gave him his energy back.

When I began this, I did it to help myself. Not only was I clearing energy, but I also stood up to him verbally if he was drunk and obnoxious. In retrospect I was sometimes reactionary, but my intention was to care for myself.

I remember one particular day, about 10 years ago, when I picked up the phone and he was obviously drunk. I told him it was unacceptable for me to talk with him when he was like that, and I hung up.

Not long after that, he stopped drinking completely cold turkey and he has been a new man ever since. Now, we have great conversations and he is a lot of fun to be with.

Did I “heal” him? We may never know, and he says he doesn’t know why he stopped drinking. But what I do know is that during the years I absorbed his energy and put up with him, things never improved. So in a sense, perhaps I healed him by not healing him anymore!!

We can never solve problems or process issues that aren’t ours. At the same time, the people they belong to can’t process them either when we do this. It’s a lose-lose.

While letting go of responsibility for others may feel scary, like we’ll lose them or lose control… and while it may be hard initially, it can be a big win for everyone in the end. At least, it’s a win for ourselves, and that’s all we can control anyway.

Yes, male energy is heavier than female energy. But that’s not “bad.” A rock is heavier than a feather. Is a rock “bad”? Does it burden the feather? Not if the feather is in it’s natural place in the air.

Ladies, if you want something to be responsible for, try being responsible for radiating your own light. For honoring your feminine creative energy and for allowing your own happiness, even bliss– no matter how anyone else is feeling.

Here’s a secret.. actually two: 1). That’s what men want anyway. It inspires them, and when they feel it they will change without us asking them to. And isn’t our own happiness what we want anyway? Win-win!

2). That’s what will make male energy in all it’s heaviness feel “good” and not a burden. When we women fill ourselves up with our own love, male energy will feel solid as a rock and not like the weight of the world.

TRY THIS:

Sit with your eyes closed, spine erect and feet flat on the ground.

Breathe in and imagine breathing love all the way down the front of your body, to your tailbone. Breathe out and imagine the love streaming up your spine and out your head, like a shower of love-light that radiates from you.

Next, imagine a rose in front of you, like a beautiful fluffy and clear rose in full bloom. See it about 3 feet out in front of you, and imagine it vacuuming out of you anyone else’s emotions, thoughts, programs, or desires that you’ve been holding.

Keep your breath flowing and just watch as the energy leaves you and goes into the rose. When you’re ready, see the rose in your mind’s eye floating off to the edge of the horizon and see it dissolve in a puff of light. Know that all those people are getting their energy back.

Take a moment again to breathe into your own body and fill yourself with light!

______________________________________________________

Want to use this article in your E-Zine or Web Site? You can, as long as you use this complete tag with it: Intuitive Healer Ann O’Brien publishes the “Flowering Sol” email newsletter to help you blossom into your light. If you’re ready to open up your intuition and creative power to fulfill your dream life, get your free gifts at www.FloweringSol.com.

____________________________________________________________

copyright 2011 Ann O’Brien- All Rights Reserved.